JON CARROLL

I imagine that Tracy and I were the only people who attended both the Rowell Ranch Junior Rodeo in Castro Valley on Saturday and the Eddie Izzard comedy show in San Francisco on Sunday. Very few Eddie Izzard fans enjoy the rodeo, and very few rodeo fans even know who Eddie Izzard is. If you're looking for a cultural fault line between Red America and Blue America, that's as good an example as any.

And yet, there were similarities between the two audiences. People at both venues were there because they really wanted to be there. At the rodeo, which features under-17 kids roping and wrestling and riding, most of the spectators were related to or friends with one or more of the participants. Even competitors who failed terribly were given a nice round of applause and compassionate encouragement from the public-address announcer.

We were no different; we were there because we knew the public-address announcer and the guy who drove the tractor between events. We were also there because our granddaughter, Alice, really likes horses. It turned out that she likes riding them more than she likes watching them being ridden, but still.

This was my fourth rodeo, and I'm now learning what to watch for, and it's great fun in a cozy, dusty way. There's not a lot of irony at a rodeo, which is a break from my usual mode of being.

The Eddie Izzard audience was drawn largely from people who signed up for his newsletter (or perhaps his text-messaging service), who got the news of the unadvertised gigs a few weeks before the news hit The Chronicle. We were there because I knew a publicist who knew some people in New York. (Note: We paid full price. No media-scum freebies here.)

The audience was therefore a bit overenthusiastic, so that even Eddie Izzard adjusting the mike stand got a round of applause. To be fair, Izzard adjusts a mike stand in a very witty way, but at the end of the day, it's still a guy with a mike stand. It's not remotely as entertaining as "Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe."

Izzard was "working on new material," so it said, although a glance at his Web site (www.eddieizzard.com, of course) suggests that he's been working on this material for some time. The material consists mainly of his thoughts on ancient Egyptians, Greeks, the Bible, God, animals and the zombification of Margaret Thatcher. There was a lot of irony in his riffs, but it was the very best irony, miles ahead of the kind I find in everyday life.

Both events started late, which was predictable. The public-address announcer at the rodeo (who was, I can obscure it no longer, Miss Molly of Miss Molly's Academy of the Horsely Arts) lost her place from time to time, in part because she was handed the wrong information. Eddie Izzard loses his place routinely; it's part of his act. It's like joke, long pause, "So that's that, then," pause, "Yes," long pause, "Where was I? Right: water."

Other observations: Percentage of men wearing blue jeans at the rodeo: somewhere north of 99. Percentage of men wearing blue jeans at Eddie Izzard show: an estimated 25. Number of black T-shirts seen at rodeo: three, all with the Jack Daniel's logo. Number of black T-shirts seen at Eddie Izzard show: 28, some with slogans so obscure that rereading them did not produce enlightenment.

The rodeo had amazing tri-tip sandwiches available for cheap; the Izzard show did not allow food or drink inside the auditorium. (Have you noticed that this regulation has been secretly altered, so plastic water bottles are no longer considered "drink" and are welcomed everywhere? Odd.) At the Izzard show, the audience was not warned to watch out for the young bulls, which can get a little crazy and jump over the fence. Izzard jumped a bit, but not over the fence.

At the rodeo, no one re-enacted the battle of Thermopylae as fought by heavily greased Spartans in the corridor of a student union building. At the rodeo, no one imitated a bee doing the pollen dance. At the rodeo, no one suggested that the Romans built viaducts in order to move ducks quickly from place to place.

At the Izzard show, there were no bulls ridden, horses galloped, or steers wrestled to the ground. (Technically, there were no bulls ridden at the rodeo either, although many tried.) At the Izzard show, no one sang "The Star-Spangled Banner." At the Izzard show, there were no charities promoted, merchants thanked or dirt clods hurled.

Everyone at the Izzard show and everyone at the rodeo left with a warm feeling of community and a happiness at the way the world was turning that particular day.

At the Eddie Izzard show, there were no behorned bales of hay for roping practice. At the rodeo, no one mentioned fox hunting.